Warning:  semi-spoiler alert.

When Dad and I had our first debates (everything is a debate with us) about the script of Courage, I was a 2 or 3 months pregnant with my first child. She was born a week before shooting began, so I was unable to help in the actual filming, though I had been heavily involved in pre-production—I’m listed in the credits as “Consulting Producer” which I joke means “Resident Cynic.”

Dad has touched briefly on the difficulty of working closely with family on a project like this, what he didn’t mention was the added difficulty of trying to explain every production decision to an overly-opinionated pregnant woman.  We debated casting decisions, dialogue, storyboarding, but the story itself has resonated with me since the beginning. Beyond the courtroom drama and political tensions, it’s a love story; a love story that realizes a truth Hollywood has forgotten, that ultimate love is sacrifice. It “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”
Sarah is the embodiment of this faithful sacrifice and, in so being, leads Sgt. Wheedle to his ultimate decision, his redemption. Better than the romantic myth is the romantic truth that a baby needs both mother and father, unselfish enough to love each other deeply, to be a strong foundation for their child.

During the nine months of pregnancy, a new mother has a chance to “get to know” the child living inside her and, for me, though I knew my husband would love our little girl wholeheartedly, there was still a bit of nervous anticipation for their “introduction.” It was more dramatic watching him meet her for the first time, than it was for me to finally see her.  She and I were like old friends saying hello, but to watch him hold her and be in love at first sight, was a blessing beyond description.
It was with this moment fresh in my mind that I was shown the first scene, in rough draft, after the first days of shooting. When Sarah Pine bursts through the crowd holding up her child to a surprised Bob Wheedle, the look Alex Oliver gave to her character -and to the moment- was perfect. Perfectly perfectly perfect. It was at once nervousness, anticipation, pride, joy, and love. It mirrored the feeling I had so recently experienced, the desire for the father of your child to approve of, to accept, to fall in love with as strongly as you have, this tiny being for whom you are both terrifyingly responsible; the hope that he’ll grasp their tiny fingers and toes and melt, too.

And that’s when the overly critical “Consulting Producer” cried like a big sissy, and knew that we were really on to something.

Happy, Dad?